Prawns chilli fry for the parents

The headline is a tribute to the book ‘The secret diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 3/4,’ by Sue Townsend.

My name is Finely Chopped.

It’s my birthday today. I turned thirteen. That means I am a teenager. Or, as my mum told my dad this morning, I have hit puberty. 

I think my dad still thinks I am a baby. I am not in a hurry to correct him.

The day started with my uncle Kashi sending a whatsapp message to congratulate my dad, as he does every morning on my birthday. He was the one who first figured out the date and remembers to message my dad every year. My dad always gets a bit surprised when he receives the message as he gets the dates mixed up! 

This year he thought it was on the 13th. At least he got the month right!

Thanks so much Kashi

Dad made French toast for breakfast. The savoury one that my grandmother used to make him when he was my age. He added cheddar flakes from the fridge to it. The ones which were leftover from the ITC Hotels gourmet box.

Dad made his fav breakfast. French toast

Dad always compensates through food. His answer to all the sticky moments that life throws at him. 

Family legend goes that when he and my mum would have tiffs when they were dating, he would go to the chemist shop at the Oberoi Hotel arcade and buy her a Lindt chocolate. After they got married he would get her a chocolate milk shake from JATC in Bandra.

Chocolate always works for my mum.

Mum got her fav prawn chilli fry

For lunch he thawed the river prawns that he had bought from Poonam recently. Our cook Banu came to work. She has been coming to our house from before I was born. Dad calls her #bunkinbanu as she bunks a lot! 

He got her to help him prep by slicing and chopping the vegetables. She then stepped out of the kitchen to do the rest of the housework. Dad loves to cook in an clean and empty kitchen with only Alexa and his phone for company. 

He then heated coconut oil in a wok, added sugar and sliced onions, finely chopped ginger and garlic next, followed by parboiled cubed potatoes, then the prawns, with salt, turmeric, black pepper and red chilli powder sprinkled on, ketchup thumped out of the bottle and green chillies and coriander leaves and curry leaves added at the end, to make prawn chilli fry. 

He remembered much later that he had forgotten to add vinegar and felt silly as this is a dish inspired by what my parents had eaten in a shack outside their hotel during their honeymoon in Goa. 

I don’t know why they still tell me these stories. Get a room guys. I am 13!

Wait, dad made his favourite comfort breakfast dish in the morning and then my mom’s favourite prawn dish for lunch.

Hello? Isn’t it my birthday? Why are they making it all about them?

Dad had it with gluten free bread. There was no pav at home.

I still remember the time when I was a baby and when my dad would talk to me from his office every day. At lunch time. At times after he was done with work and while waiting for the work day to come to an end. Using the office internet and comp.

Then my mum gave him his first laptop and he would come to my room to put me to sleep every night. Telling me short stories of where he had lunch that day or which new restaurant in the city that mum and him had visited or what new dish he had cooked for dinner.

At times he would travel on work, or the two of them would go on holidays, and he would go cyber cafes or the hotel business centre to write to me every night.

Then he stopped going to office. He had found others to tell his food stories. His columns in newspapers, magazines and website. His book. That took over the space that his cubicle had occupied in his life. He would spend the day telling these stories and would be exhausted at the end of it.

Our nightly story telling sessions stopped. Instead he would come to me occasionally and tell me long stories. Over two or three days. Of the places he travelled to in India and abroad. What he would eat there. Whom he would meet there. What he would learn there. 

He would rarely told me about what was happening in Mumbai anymore or what was happening in his life everyday. 

He would tell those to my baby brothers now. Twitter. Then Instagram. 

I think that our long sessions would tire hime. Writing, editing, subbing, typing. He is growing old I guess.  

Still, I knew that he enjoyed our time together. 

Even if he did not talk to me that often. Spent that much time with me.

Which was cool. I was no longer a baby!

Dad doesn’t give up on family selfies 😏

Talking of brothers. I suddenly have two more. They are cats. I thought that my dad likes all pets, but not cats. And that my mum loved no pets. 

Look at them now. Dad wakes up and feeds the boys before anything else. Mom cleans their litter whenever needed. Parents are so unpredictable!

The elder one is called Baby Loaf and he is around a year and a half old. Which makes him close to a teen in cat years. He moved in in February. He likes his own space. Baby Loaf often sits by us when daddy tells me stories. 

The younger one is little Nimki. He is about 5 months old. He moved in in May. That makes him around 4 years in human years. Little Nimki clambers all over daddy when he can. 

Things are a bit different now. Ever since this thing called the ‘lockdown’ happened. Mum and dad have been home for the last seven months. Never out for more than an hour at a go. Even now, when things have began to open up. 

“Discretion is the better part of valour,” says dad but I know him very well. I know that he is enjoying this time at home with all of us. 

Mum seems to be too. She works from home. That keeps her busy. 

Dad spends time with me and talks to me a lot more than he has in a long, long time. 

He tells me about what he has made for the #FinelyChoppedBreakfasts. Lunch and dinner too. What he calls his #LittleJackHornerMeals. Specially when made in the #FinelyChoppedKitchen.

At times he tells me about home chefs and the lovely food that they have been serving during the lockdown from their #foodocracykitchens. 

At times he tells me about where he gets his produce from. About Mhosin (9820420136) the mutton wala from Worli who comes with amazing mutton on Sunday. About Poonam (9867402956) of Khar fish market who delivers at home these days versus earlier when he would go to the market to buy fish. He says that we must #supportsmallbusiness and be #vocalforlocal

He tells me about what my brothers, Baby Loaf and little Nimki, have been up to in the #HouseOfCats

He tells me about the music he tells about the music he gets Alexa to play for him in the kitchen when he cooks. Dire Straits, Pink Floyd, the Police, Queen, Wham, the Beatles, ABBA, the Eagles, Bruce Springsteen, Bryan Adams, Bon Jovi, UB40, Scorpions. I do not have the heart to tell him that I have not even heard of the stars from the #FinelyChoppedKitchenPlaylists.

He tells me about how he finds ways to use leftovers in the kitchen. #LoveYourLeftovers he tells me, just as my grandparents had once told him.

He seems to be cooking a lot more since the lockdown and seems to have a lot to tell me. Even if he rarely goes out of home and of our lane. 

Forget across the city, the country and the world.

I know that I am a teenager now. My time to be aloof and want my space. To hang with my friends. 

Well, unlike earlier, hardly any of my old friends are around. I hardly see any blogs anymore. Most of the kids around are friends of my brother, Instagram.  

Dad tells me that chatting with me keeps him centred while he stays at home these days. That he treasures the fact that I am always there to listen to him no matter what. For we are family. That I am his own. His flesh and blood. 

I know that I am a teenager now, but I think I will continue being daddy’s little baby for some more time. 

My old man needs me.

KK: I have no idea if a real teenager will say this, but hey its my blog and my voice. 

Thank you for reading. For being with me through this wonderful journey. 

We have come a long way since K opened the blog on 7th October 2020 and named it too. A life changing moment if there ever was one.

Happy birthday Finely Chopped.

Here’s an Instagram live broadcast that I did on Finely Chopped turning 13 and what the blog means to me:

I finished this post and the doorbell rang. Turned out that our friend Gia, AKA the @thecloudcutter on Instagram, one of the earliest friends whom I had made through the blog and who joined the live above, had sent us a delightful burnt Basque cheesecake from Daniel Pattisier for the bloganniversary. She spoke to our watchman on the phone and convinced him to deliver it as a surprise and what a lovely surprise it was indeed and that is how we had a wonderful dessert to mark the day.